How to Price Items to Sell!

Marko's "Nothings Sells and Nobody Buys Anything" article got my attention, and I realised I hadn't posted here in months. So here is my 2 cents worth on how I price my farmed, and not very good, items to sell. Turnover is key to making gold in Diablo 3, not that single big ticket item you dream of finding while doing runs or flipping. This is the way to make gold while just playing the game with no real market knowledge required or niche markets to try and corner!

While doing runs the majority of what you find is frankly garbage - case in point the boots I did a search similar for in the AH:

They have all the key ingredients for a pair of non-set Monk or Demon Hunter boots, but obviously don't even come closeto the Billion+ ramges we see with an unfiltered Search.

My potential buyer is a newly dinged Monk that is probably someones alt. They aren't going to be spending 1,000,000,000 per item gearing this new character, they just want the basics to make a start on Inferno. Dex, Vit, All Res, and Movement Speed. Anyone who has played a Monk or Demon Hunter should understand the basic stat requirements for each class, without having to get into the depth of IAS or crit benchmarks and which is better Acrhon or CM Wizards for example, or whether a piece without IAS will be potentially better for certain popular Witch Doctor builds.

None of the are stats are particularly high for this item, but they are at least all there, so I expect to do significantly better than vendor or salvage, if I can get it sold FAST. So my price needs to be bottom dollar to sell quickly and not sit for a day and a half clogging up one of my 10 slots just to return to my stash.

Lets see what our buyer can get in the 1,000,000 and below price range:

Note I've sorted by Dexterity as this is the main factor I belive will affect my potential buyers choice of footwear in a given price range. Only include those stats that your potential buyer (the newly dinged monk whats/needs to enter inferno and maybe enable mp1-mp3. He is not looking for life regen, exp, gold/magic find, thorns etc. and all the other junk stats which while nice won't help him past the difficulty barriers ahead.

Ok, we are getting closer with all those 160ish dex boots, but mine are only 154 so let's try 500,000:

Ok, now we are in the ball bark, however there are 2 things to note here:
1: Our items stats are the minimum for the search so lets consider our search parameters, I'm lowering dex to 100 (30% lower) for the next search to see what I'm competing with while keeping the remaining stats the same.
2: I want to sell fast, so I need to significantly undercut the competition, which here 300,000 will get my buyer better boots all around.

So after all of about 1min I have my final search. I'm seeing boots with less Dex but the same or more Vit, AR, and Movement speed for 100,000g, 150,000g and 2 at 200,000g so I listed mine at 150,000g

I listed these right after logging in my newly freed up slots and they sold within the 2 hours I was playing and gathering more similar items that I used the same methods to list at the end of my play session.

I play on average 2 hours a night or less, about 3-4 nights a week, have not parted with any of my own money on the RMAH, although have turned over my battle net balance a couple times in gold and gear buying and selling to kit out my characters.

Feel free to contact me in game on Kurllkrum#1929. I am currently focusing on Hardcore leveling all five classes by "leapfrogging" which I intend to share with my readers in a subsequent post. Currently lvl 35-40 on each class with 2 tragic deaths of Demon Hunters!

Which follower do you use?

On an earlier post I wrote about my build as I was nearing level 30 and Nightmare. 12 Hours Played Build and Progress. I updated my Build in Hell and this has been holding steady through Act 1 and I'm now at Act 2 Chapter 6 Inferno. I also posted A Barbarian Build that works!

Solo Inferno Butcher is on farm in my main build with 5 stacks of Nephalem Valor. Act 2 has been rushed to Chapter 6 sipping everything possible as looking at the sun in that desert will kill you without resistances! I'm looking forward to going back with more gear to kill Magdha again, ideally with 5 stacks and some friends to help on the control side of mob killing and kiting which is becoming more necessary in Inferno.

To that end I want to answer a question I had from Pitlord "Which Follower do you Use?"

In Solo play followers can be both a major asset and a total liability. I am currently using the Enchantress in Inferno butcher farming runs. Templar for Magic/Gold Find to keep down time to a minimum and GF/MF maxed out. The Scoundrel comes out for boss fights where I'm likely pushing the enrage due to build

Here are the builds I use for each and my reasoning behind each, and when I choose to use each.

https://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/follower#0100!1000!0000

The Enchantress is who I'm using right now, whinny voice, kinda annoying ditsy blond chick. But she has some nice utility:

Charm. The charmed enemy is attack able by both you and it's buddies, and attacks it's buddies. It's not doing any damage to me and it's keeping it's buddies from wailing on me. It can equate to 100% damage reduction for 4 seconds which is an eternity in this game. The alternative knock back from Forceful Push messes with my Barb that needs to be in melee range to do damage and self heal. It is too unpredictable when she will use it to help with kiting.

Powered Armor, as with all armor in this game beats the Reflect Missiles due simply to Armor in Diablo 3 reduces ALL types of damage.

Disorientate is 2 secs for an entire group that are now not wailing on me. While I'd like the 15% damage taken pool of Erosion Diablo 3 require intensive movement to avoid hits and damage from the environment so keeping champions and rares that would really benefit from being nuked with an extra 15% DPS in the pool becomes a dangerous proposition.

Focused Mind seemingly goes against my previous choices of control, but the 60sec Cd on Mass Control, and the ditsy blond way she will use all controls on Cd, can't be controlled by the player, and we have no tracking of her internal Cool downs short of a stopwatch makes it unreliable at best. While Focused Mind with my Smite runed Frenzy benefits more from 3% attack speed.

The Templar is my first choice for any farmable content below Inferno. The reason being his shields gives me an extra magic/gold find slot over the other 2 followers:

 Heal vs Taunt. I'm the tank. If you taunt and die who is going to heal me. If I get below 50% you can bet I have a revenge ready, I don't need you taunting mobs away so they are out of range. I need more revenge procs to farm this content faster!

Intimidate relies on enemies hitting the Templar, so fail for me. Life Regen is always nice. I have pitifully low values of Life per sec on gear so it takes forever to heal out of combat, so Loyalty is the only choice here.

Charge and Onslaught. Don't get any ideas about your follower doing a ton of DPS and finishing off that rare pack while you go for a coffee. 200% of naff all is still naff all! I'll take the stun. If I'm in trouble I can open some distance, pot, wait on Cd's before jumping back in.

Guardian vs Inspire. The saddest thing for me in the Barbarian gameplay is the lack of fury spending we are seeing due to the fury generators simply being better than the spenders. I'm not going to rant about class design, but Inspire..lol. Guardian saved my life a few times in Hell, but I also found that a healing build Templar can be a liability against Vampiric + pool of bad stuff mobs. He will stand in the pool healing himself, which translates to healing the mob that dropped it!

The scoundrel is one I'm yet to find any real use for on my Barbarian other than damage dealing, but hres my take on him:

I could see myself bringing him along to a boss fight like the Butcher were I'm pushing the enrage timer if he hides in a fire area and I can't get decent uptime on him. However Follower DPS is lack lustre at best, so not used this guy much.

Crippling Shot vs. Poision Bolts is simply slows vs DPS. I don't rate slows as highly as I maybe would as something other than a Barbarian, but I'm not a kiter. Stuns do helpout, but unless someone is going to inform me that it also slows mob attack speed I'll take the DPS and just burn the bad guys down.

Dirty Fighting is the clear winner for me here. If my follower needs to Vanish to self heal it's becuase the AI fails and he stood in bad stuff. Either way he will self resurect in a matter of seconds so I'm not going to go to any lenghts to keep him alive, including talenting. Dirty Fighting however has potential to keep me alive, and that much more important!

Multishot vs Powered Snot, yes I called it powered snot due to the whopping 25% weapon damage it does. Most boss fights do have some adds making Multishot work for me, and although I'm a lover of stuns against Rare/Champions were mechanics just don't exist if you are relying on stun locks to kill bosses you are failing at mechanics becuase nearly everything is avoidable to the extent that they have "check me out I did it naked achievements".

Anatomy and Hysteria are simply a question of how much crit do you already have. I have next to zero so 3% extra is going to be more benefit than a proc that relies on something that has next to zero chance of happening. Can I rely on a crit every 6seconds to keep the Hysteria buff up at it's max uptime of 50% for 10% increased damage, or is 3% crit with 100% the better choice.

Hope my explaination of what I use and why helps you make your own descisions about your followers. See you in game and Good Luck!

A Barbarian Build that works!

There has been alot on the forums about how gimped the Barbarian class is but having gotten to 60 I wanted to share my build which I used for solo play through Hell and into Inferno.

Frenzy increases attack speed and is a very good DPS tool. Triumph can be uses for more self healing from 22 to 59 when you get Maniac. Since the DPS from Rend whih will follow 5 stacks of Manic it boosts Rends Blood lust healing. In Inferno control becomes more important so Smite has been my rune of choice.
Rend takes Blood Lust for a sustained self heal during combat, while also doing some of the highest weapon damage, albiet over time of any secondary skill.
Ignore Pain is in there for those "oh &%$#" moments when that arcane vortex molten waller combo pulls you into stuff you can't immediately get out of! I previously had Weapon Throw in here which worked well chasing down casters, but with the combos in later difficulty I feel the cooldown is needed, And Contempt for Weakness does a ton of damage alongside the Enchantresses Reflect Spells ability softening up weaker casters during the big pulls.
Revenge is your main big heal, 5% per mob hit and I find I want it up as often as possible. In a heavy fight (10+ mobs) with Provocation it can and does proc back to back making it my biggest DPS and Heal skill and second only to keeping frenzy up.
War Cry with Invigorate boosts your HP and provides health regen and fury at the start of the fight so you have something gong in.
Wrath of the Berserker is to do as much damage to something as fast a possible to start the health globes dropping, boost you heals from Rend, or break snares!

Defensive passives are kind of overlooked at lower difficulties, but really make or break your build a the higher difficulties in solo play. I have alot of Vitality on gear, and still take massive damage from 10+ mobs in melee combat. The armor from Nerves of Steel is paramount to reducing that damage while I get the Self Heals rolling.
Superstition is an anti-Caster and Anti-Arcane, Molten, Plagued, Waller (or similar get stuck in bad stuff on the floor...it will happen!)
Relentless is the most awesome passive in the game. It has kept me alive for the next Revenge proc, Potion CD, Health Orb drop, Ignore Pain CD, next Wrath of the Berserker or just waiting for the chance to move and kite for a bit so many times. A really life saving passive!
*Edit I have since changed Relentless to Nerves of Steal. Add Armor Value equal to 100% of Vitality. This actually doubles my armor value through the vitality on gear and my damage reduction, effectively getting me 50% reduced damage without the need for being low HP!
So from this I get a rotation of sorts/priority for abilities.
Start pull with War Cry up, then Rend to get Self heals rolling, get frenzy stacked to 5 and by then Revenge will have procs and melee mobs will have closed in for the Revenge heal. Waiting for revenge I was probably under 20% HP and being kept alive by Relentless. Now I'm back to full HP. Use Revenge every proc while not letting Frenzy or Rend fall off your targets and you are good to go. Use Ignore Pain and Wrath against Rare and Champion packs.